At the beginning of the 1990s, restaurants in hotels were seen as something of a necessary evil. Hotel guests tended to avoid them because of the "New Russian" clientele they attracted. The restaurants did not bring in any stable revenue, but it was considered bon ton for a hotel to have one. Today the situation has changed radically; restaurants are often seen as the face that the hotel presents to the world, and they can bring in up to a third of a hotel’s revenues.

The main problem with hotel restaurants is their lack of individuality. They have to blend in with the hotel in which they are located, and this makes it hard to compete with ordinary restaurants. Hotels that are part of international chains cater to a diverse range of guests who do not want something too unfamiliar on their plates. This means that many hotels have restaurants that stick to an international and neutral style of mainly European cuisine. The lack of culinary originality means that local gourmets are not likely to visit hotel restaurants. Not all hotels can afford to have a restaurant specializing in national cuisine. Hotels with several restaurants can afford this luxury, but small hotels with just one tend to offer an international menu likely to suit the maximum number of people.

Of late, however, hotel owners have begun to develop their restaurant businesses and have even begun competing with traditional restaurants.

"Hotel directors are moving away from having one big restaurant with international cuisine to having several small restaurants offering various specialties," said Marina Smirnova, general director of the Hotel Consulting and Development Group. "They assume that guests will want to try different things and sample different cuisines rather than spending every evening in the same place."

New hotels are following this approach. If a hotel has five stars, it must show some culinary originality, as its guests constitute a demanding public used to a high standard. The five-star Ararat Park Hyatt, for example, offers guests three restaurants and two bars with different cuisine: Gallereya, with mixed European cuisine, Enoki, with Japanese cuisine, Ararat, offering Armenian cuisine, and two bars, Neglinka and the musically themed Konservatoriya.

Old hotels are reconstructing and expanding their restaurants. The Aerostar Hotel Moscow, for example, decided to open a specialized restaurant to attract local diners and came up with the unique Brasserie Erte, which offers northern French cuisine. The number of guests and the revenue at the restaurant rose sharply.

Andrew Ivanyi, general manager at the Aerostar, said that hotel restaurants are always a challenge. They have to appeal to the hotel guests, and they should attract some trade from outside as well. "We tried to choose formulas of universal appeal," Ivanyi said. "Brasserie Erte is an all-day restaurant open from breakfast to dinner. It is a blend of Art Deco and Art Nouveau reminiscent of the traditional brasseries of Paris. The dishes also reflect the simple but delicious food of high-class French brasseries – pan-seared cod, entrecote bearnaise and bread-and-butter pudding with vanilla sauce. In Brasserie Erte we average 80 percent hotel guests. The situation in Borodino, our ‘haute-cuisine’ restaurant open evenings only, is reversed in that 80 percent come from outside."

Lack of space means that some hotels take the option of dividing one large restaurant into several sections. The Novotel’s main restaurant, for example, has a section decorated with folk motifs and offering Russian national cuisine. As for the National Hotel, its location opposite the Kremlin makes it almost obligatory that it offer Russian cuisine.

"We focus especially on Russian cuisine; it’s our specialty," said National PR manager Anna Amosova. "This definitely attracts foreign guests and local people who appreciate good Russian cuisine. The National’s head chef, Anatoly Galkin, was chef for Russian dishes in many of the world’s fashionable restaurants and was personal chef for Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin."

This strategy helps the National attract diners from outside the hotel. "We have quite a high percentage of diners from outside, and our advertising campaigns are focused on attracting them," Amosova said. "Every month we have a special offer for the bar and restaurant. In June, for example, we have a special Strawberries and Champagne menu, in July it will be homemade ice cream and sherbets, and all summer there will be a barbecue in the open-air inner courtyard."

The Metropol Hotel has three restaurants, each with an element of Russian cuisine. "There is always demand for Russian cuisine," said Metropol PR manager Yekaterina Yegorova. "But there are different kinds of Russian cuisine. There is traditional old Russian cuisine, and there is the aristocratic cuisine of the 19th century, which was heavily influenced by French cuisine. The Boyarsky restaurant offers this cuisine of the nobility."

All three restaurants at the Metropol are based on European cuisine. "This is because, when we opened in 1991, we had make ourselves something of a city within a city," Yegorova said. "Our guests did not have to leave the hotel to eat; everything they needed was available here."

The Metropol restaurant, the biggest of the three, seats 150 people. This is where guests have breakfast, and, in the evenings, it is where banquets and celebrations are held. Yegorova said it is in demand, as there is a shortage of venues in Moscow for holding high-class banquets.

Hotel owners say that demand for banquet service doubled in 2003. Hotels use conference halls and other premises for organizing banquets. Many hotel banquet service clients are private individuals. Weddings, anniversaries and so on account for up to 20 percent of the Baltschug Kempinski Hotel’s banquet-service revenues, for example.

The Sheraton Palace’s Road to Success program offers a number of special menus: An American menu, a Pacific menu and a Chocolate menu. Hotel restaurants also generate revenue from other activities going on in the hotel, for example, when activity organizers order lunch for the participants. If the group has 30-40 people, it is more profitable for the hotel to offer the group a buffet-style meal. Yelena Ukhova, PR manager at the Sheraton Palace, said that conferences and activities of this sort account for 15 percent of the hotel kitchen’s orders.

Hotel restaurants offering international cuisine are an ideal place for business lunches or Sunday brunches offering an unlimited amount of food and drinks.

"Brunches aim, above all, at families with children, so there is a special menu for children and we invite clowns and professional educators," according to the Aerostar’s PR department. "We also have activities on holidays; New Year, Christmas, Easter, Valentine’s Day. These kinds of activities can ensure good business during the weekends, which is a quiet time for business hotels."

The Metropol’s Yevropeisky restaurant often has special-cuisine months that attract a large number of of customers. "Our chef was the first to prepare young asparagus in Moscow," said Metropol’s Yegorova. "Our restaurant also offers a game menu twice a year, a fish menu and special holiday menus for Easter and so on. Customers from outside coming for the business lunch account for around half the restaurant’s clients."

A well-organized restaurant can bring in increasing revenues and contribute up to a third of the hotel’s general revenues. "If you take the general annual figures, food and beverages account for around a third of revenues and come in second place after room sales," said the National’s Amosova.

"It is no secret that hotels rely on their room sales for the bulk of their profit," said the Aerostar’s Ivanyi. "Having said that, bars and restaurants are a necessary service component of any hotel and reflect the desired image. Gross profits from hotel food and beverage outlets in Moscow vary from 25 to 35 percent of total revenue."